David Brooks is never going to be anything but a Republican apologist. But at least he dwells in the realm of reality as he tries to explain Barack Obama to any Republican who is still capable of thinking past Tea Bagger talking points.

I think he’s pretty close to the mark, at least as far as a Republican can get. Not saying I’m on his bandwagon, but the GOP is going to need a LOT more people like Brooks if you are gonna get folks like me to believe that any of their arguments come from a place of sanity. As for now, there’s no reasoning with that party on anything.

Someone really needs to remind the president that the people are mostly behind him on nearly all his policy goals. He is never going to be looked on well by the racist Republicans so he honestly, at this point, stop trying so hard to get them on board.

As long as they are preaching secession every time they lose an election, they aren’t coming on board. Even for policies they themselves have offered. When they start acting like adults, and American ones at that, include them. Until then, lead decisively and in the best interests of the nation.

Here is the transcript, followed by the video:

Additionally some followup notes from the White House.

HuffPo has a top 10 quotes list from the speech.

Plus a good piece by Gail Collins on the angry speech of the day.

And a decent analysis piece on the speech by E.J. Dionne.

To advance that progress, we’ve sought new beginnings with Muslim communities around the world, one in which we engage on the basis of mutual interest and mutual respect, and work together to fulfill the aspirations that all people share — to get an education, to work with dignity, to live in peace and security. That’s what America believes in. That’s the vision that is far more powerful than the hatred of these violent extremists.

Here at home, we will strengthen our defenses, but we will not succumb to a siege mentality that sacrifices the open society and liberties and values that we cherish as Americans, because great and proud nations don’t hunker down and hide behind walls of suspicion and mistrust. That is exactly what our adversaries want, and so long as I am President, we will never hand them that victory. We will define the character of our country, not some band of small men intent on killing innocent men, women and children.

And in this cause, every one of us — every American, every elected official — can do our part. Instead of giving into cynicism and division, let’s move forward with the confidence and optimism and unity that defines us as a people. For now is not a time for partisanship, it’s a time for citizenship — a time to come together and work together with the seriousness of purpose that our national security demands.

That’s what it means to be strong in the face of violent extremism. That’s how we will prevail in this fight. And that’s how we will protect our country and pass it — safer and stronger — to the next generation.

– President Obama on improving American security

You know, because I voted for a President who takes responsibility and fixes problems instead of one who points fingers and runs away every time something dangerous happens.

Keep it up Prez!

Bob lays out the numbers for relevance given the GOP’s cowardly attacks on the President. Our country is safe despite their efforts to undermine our credibility and security. Follow the link for more details on how he came up with this data.

More to challenge the naysayers with.

Not that they can be reasoned with.

For those naysayers and disgruntled psycho-Clintonites, yes, the President has been up to all kinds of good stuff.

(W)e were forced to take those steps largely without the help of an opposition party which, unfortunately, after having presided over the decision-making that led to the crisis, decided to hand it over to others to solve.

– President Obama, calling out Republicans for creating the mess they are yelling at him for trying to fix

More please. The President gave a speech on the economy and what he hopes to do to help it along. In it, he acknowledged – finally – that Republicans have done nothing but try to obstruct anything he tries to do to fix their screwups.

Seriously, until they start playing a part in fixing the country they broke, call them out on it. They weren’t going to support you anyway.

Remember, it could be worse. We could be under the reign of President Palin now, with Johnny Mac being poisoned, err, had “an incident” back in June or something. You think things look bleak now, life under her rule would be pure bloody anarchy.

So, read this and this with that in mind, no matter if it means you lost out on a Playboy pictorial of a heavily airbrushed moose hunter to spike her ratings during whatever scandal du jour knocked her favorable ratings down.

The success of his first year will be largely dependent on the outcome of the health care debate, but Obama may soon be able to point to his first 12 months in office and say he rescued the economy from a depression, passed the health care reform bill Americans have been waiting decades for, approved most progressive budget bill in a generation, got a Supreme Court nominee confirmed, lifted the ban on stem-cell research, passed a national service bill, passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, passed new regulations of the credit card industry, passed new regulation of the tobacco industry, achieved some key counter-terrorism successes, and helped improve the nation’s standing on the world stage.

There have been plenty of painful missed opportunities, but as first years go, this isn’t bad. Imagine what Obama’s record would be like if Republicans hadn’t gone mad and if supermajorities weren’t needed on every vote in the Senate. (Or better yet, imagine what Obama’s record would be like if he entered office in 2001, with a strong economy and massive surplus.)

Whether you like it or not, if you voted for President Obama last year, you are partly responsible for this strategy. That’s not entirely a bad thing depending on your position on the war, but it’s worth repeating that the president never spoke of drawing down our forces in the Af-Pak region during the campaign, nor did he mention such a thing during his first 10 months in office.

From this article from Bob Cesca.

Maybe this ruins some of my liberal credentials, but I figure that if you start a war, you’d better finish the damn thing or create conditions to make it look like you did what you could before bailing out. I mean, hell, it took a Democrat to get us through World War II. Not to mention World War I as well.

Hell, the simple act of electing a Republican started the Civil War. Yeah, that’s unfair to Lincoln but it is an absolute fact. And barring Vietnam, I can’t think of another war out there the Republicans didn’t fan the flames of. And Vietnam is just another in a long series of lessons of “don’t try to clean up French screwups” with all apologies to the French.

In any event, if you voted for Obama and didn’t know he was going to escalate the war in Afghanistan, you, frankly, are a fucking idiot. You should have wrote in for Kucinich and then bitched and whined about it, because Barack flat out told you we were going to go back and finish that war. And I truly hope he does and without much more deaths to our forces.

I don’t get all these folks who are crying that Obama isn’t the peacemaker he apparently told them personally he was going to be. HE TOLD YOU WE WOULD CONTINUE THE FIGHT MORONS!

I swear, the people I align myself with. Thankfully the Rethugs are repressed gays and unrepressed bigots otherwise they’d almost be attractive. Ha! I kid.

But seriously, to take back this nation from racist religious zealots, you need a hard-headed, big-hearted, patient but fearless guy. That’s what we’ve got. No ego-windbag Clinton, no well-meaning but pacifist Kucinich. We’ve got Obama. He, to date, hasn’t done anything he hadn’t already advertised he was going to try to do. He’s got a list, you know what it is, and he’s going down it. Not as fast as everyone would like, but you already KNOW how this is going to work.

So stop crying and pretending like this is shocking or something.